


Copper and Coal

by makunara



Category: One Piece
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-06-07
Updated: 2012-06-07
Packaged: 2017-11-07 05:04:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,358
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/427182
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/makunara/pseuds/makunara
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A collection of drabbles written about Luffy and Nami's relationship—both friendship and some romantic involvement. They are all meant to take place when the two are in their mid twenties.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Storm

**Author's Note:**

> I don't own One Piece or any of its characters and plot lines. Oda does and always will.
> 
> But I do own what I wrote in these drabbles.
> 
> Thanks for reading! Please comment/review to inspire me to write more!

"Wait, don't-"

She felt the soft crunch of the straw hat cup the top of her head. "Hold onto this for me one more time, alright?"

Nami shook her head, her long orange curls tossing about her panicked face as she reached for Luffy. "You shouldn't go on your own, Luffy," she managed in a broken voice. "I'll go with you."

His hand grabbed the wrist of her hand that had grabbed at his vest, pulling himself away from her grasp. "No, Nami, I'll be fine."

She opened her mouth to protest, but instead focused on the burning touch of his hand encircling her wrist and then the scarring sensation she felt when he finally released her and walked away.

In a desperation, Nami finally cried out before he walked off the Sunny. "You shouldn't have to go it alone . . . I'm your nakama, it's my job to help you!"

Luffy shook his head, turning around to stare at her face. Her swimming brown eyes matched the equally stormy weather that was coming their way from the west. "You're my nakama, and it's my job to protect you," Luffy corrected her, a bit sharper than Nami thought he was capable of talking.

Chewing her lip to control an oncoming sob, Nami listened to his footsteps as he padded off the wooden deck. She was shocked in that moment at how much he had mentally grown in the past five years since they had been reunited at Sabaody, and even more so at how she hadn't realized he had done so until now. She had sailed the seas with him for almost seven years, and she hadn't realized until now that his demeanor was more along the lines of a normal twenty-five year old than she gave him credit.

"I'm almost the pirate king, Nami!" he called out to her before disappearing from the ship. His signature grin split over his face. "And I'll need my navigator and my hat more than ever, so don't follow me!"

Moved by his words, the woman with the orange hair smiled through the tears that rolled down her face. Though he had matured over the years, his reassuring nature had never changed. She shot him a hopeful, wavering smile against her worried tears and frown.

"When Sanji comes back, I'll tell him to go ahead and start making dinner," she called to him one last time.

His smile lightened instead of widening and his eyes softened instead of brightening at her promise. "Heh," he sighed before jumping from the Sunny to the ground below.

The raindrops followed his exit.


	2. Tangerines

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't own One Piece or any of its characters and plot lines. Oda does and always will.
> 
> But I do own what I wrote in these drabbles.
> 
> Thanks for reading! Please comment/review to inspire me to write more!

She woke to the fresh scent of tangerines filtered behind her own warm breath hitting her in the face. And though she opened her eyes, Nami only saw a mildly lighter expanse in front of her. It wasn't normal for mid-day. Finally, she registered there was a physical hindrance over her face, and as she leaned forward from her supine position it fell to her lap. Luffy's straw hat.

_Hours before, Nami yawned one last time over the map work she had been working on all night and early morning. She moved from her library quarters and map desk to get a good feel for the weather around dawn but didn't have near enough energy to drag herself from the table on the lawn on the Sunny's deck to the room she and Robin shared._

_Laying her head on the books and maps she had spread out about the table, she let her eyes fall closed as the sun finally came fully over the horizon._

"Leave her," Zoro told a prying Sanji about an hour later who was obsessively pining over the gorgeous snoozing Nami. "She doesn't want to be bothered by you ever, especially when she's trying to sleep." 

_"I don't need your input, Shitty Marimo!" Sanji exclaimed, quickly rebuking and shushing himself for possibly waking his darling orange-haired Nami-swan.  
Another half hour passed before Luffy finally emerged from the kitchen, satisfied with Sanji's amazing breakfast. Stretching as he crossed the lawn, he did a double-take at the odd sleeping habit that Nami had suddenly adopted. He couldn't remember the last time he had seen her sleeping outside the map room or her bedroom._

_"Silly Nami . . ." he teased under his breath, suppressing a loud laugh. "You'll burn sleeping outside!"_

_His charcoal eyes went to her already-pinkened skin, clearly flushed from the sun bearing down on her. Since he had been forbidden to enter the girls' room, he quickly thought of another place to move her where her skin wouldn't be exposed to the sun._

_Luffy pushed aside the books and maps that were in his way before he hoisted the sleeping woman against him, picking her up easily from the slumped sitting position in which she had fallen asleep._

_He scooped her into his arms, pushing the chair aside as she subconsciously shifted against him. Her arms wrapped about his bare torso beneath his open vest as she snuggled up against his warmth, expelling a soft sigh in contentment. Luffy chuckled softly at her reaction to being moved and easily readjusted her weight in his arms to match her new cradled position._

_Padding across the Sunny's lawn, he carefully carried her up the curling stairs to the main mast making sure every step or two he wasn't jostling her too much. The last thing he wanted was her to wake and tear his head off from moving her when he only had good intentions._

_Rounding the back of the mast, Luffy finally came to her tangerine trees and laid her carefully down on the bench beneath their shade. She had asked Franky to build her a bench a couple of years ago so she could simply come to relax by the trees whenever she felt like it. Luffy couldn't understand why she didn't sleep there since it seemed like a perfect napping spot as well._

_He chewed his lip as the aroma of tangerines swam to his nose, awakening another bout of endless hunger. Frowning, he looked forlornly at the ripe fruit hanging above them just knowing how angry he would make his navigator if he swiped just one. So, Luffy restrained himself, instead sighing before his stomach could growl at him and making sure Nami was comfortable and completely out of the sun's rays._

_Content with his work, the captain smiled down at his navigator while reaching for the round crown of his straw hat. Removing it from his head, he softly placed it over her face to shield the remaining light from her closed lids. It was a practice he always did when he dozed, so it seemed only natural to impose the same ideology on her. His limber fingers tucked a few strands of her long, curly hair behind her ear._

_"Sleep well, Nami!" he whispered over her with a grin and a light laugh between his teeth._

With a light smile about her lips, Nami stretched and rose from the bench she sat under, piecing together why she wasn't still napping over her books on the lawn. As she stood up from the bench, she plucked three of the nicest looking tangerines from Bell-mére's trees.

She found Luffy in the kitchen (to no surprise) minutes later. She greeted him with a warm smile, extending his hat back out to him with a small "thanks" added with it. 

He blinked at her, his eyes going back and forth between his hat and her smiling face. It wasn't until he took the opposite side of the brim from her that he saw three tangerines peeking at him from the inside of his hat.

His eyes lit up immediately, mouth watering at the shiny orange flesh of the fruits. Instinctively, he jumped up from his chair at the table and crunched the hat and tangerines between his body and Nami's, wrapping her in a hug.

Taken aback, Nami blinked for a moment before she relaxed against him, returning his embrace with satisfaction at his gratitude.

"You should fall asleep outside more often," Luffy teased.

Nami supposed that wasn't such a bad idea.


End file.
